


Language, For You

by Ruquas



Series: Clint Barton Bingo [20]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Past Abuse, M/M, clintbartonbingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-23
Updated: 2019-06-23
Packaged: 2020-05-18 07:08:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19329592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruquas/pseuds/Ruquas
Summary: When she disappeared, he crushed the hearing aids. The world was loud enough and the hurtful words Barney and Trickshot had thrown at him were bad enough. He never wanted to be distracted again just because he could hear.





	Language, For You

When he was six, it was… difficult. He couldn‘t understand what the other kids were saying. Didn‘t know what the teachers were saying. Only knew what Barney was saying because he talked while looking at Clint. Sure, he could have tried to use the sign language the special teacher taught them, saying it would help them. Would help Clint to find his way in the world.

But Barney hated it. Said it hurt his fingers. But it didn‘t matter because Barney was with him and Clint could talk and Barney would talk very clearly. That was enough.

~*~*~

Clint was eleven when they ran away. The orphanage had tried to set them up with a new family. The social worker told them that they knew sign language because the mother was also deaf. And even though he knew he shouldn‘t be nervous, he really wanted to meet them, wanted to meet someone who was just like him.

And then Barney woke him up, the night before they had to go to the new family. Told Clint they would run away because once they saw how bad Barney was with signing, they would bring Barney back and then they would get separated forever. Clint didn‘t want that. Sure it would have been nice to know someone else who couldn‘t hear and someone to sign with again, but Barney was his brother. His everything.

When they joined the circus, he couldn‘t understand the people working there at first but they began to talk clearly to him when they wanted something, so it was fine.

He still had problems with following the teachers in the schools the circus send them to. But at least he could read the books without that much problems because the orphanage had tried to teach him as good as possible. It was good because the teachers didn‘t felt bad that they had to lug him along.

~*~*~

When he turned sixteen, the knife-thrower and his brother gave him hearing aids. They were an older model, and sometimes didn‘t work right, but they helped. He could help with the shows, even got his own act after a few months.

But when he was alone, or just working the usual work that a circus brought with it, he took them out. Everything was too loud after ten years in complete silence. Barney refused to talk to him when he did that because now Clint didn‘t have an excuse anymore to act like a child when Barney didn‘t sign. And the other people at the circus were… irritated. But it was okay, they just continued to speak very clearly, as he (and maybe Barney) was the only one who knew sign language.

He dropped out of school the next day because he could. He knew that he wouldn‘t be graduate, he still couldn‘t really follow the teachers

~*~*~

Clint was twenty-three when he laid in a hospital bed, waiting for the nurse to disappear. She was nice, wrote everything down he needed to know because she couldn‘t sign and the hospital didn‘t have an interpreter and, as she wrote down, had a quite heavy accent when she talked so lip reading would be a bit difficult.

When she disappeared, he crushed the hearing aids. The world was loud enough and the hurtful words Barney and Trickshot had thrown at him were bad enough. He never wanted to be distracted again just because he could hear.

~*~*~

At S.H.I.E.L.D., there were a few people who spoke ASL. But no one did, except Coulson. Because they got him new aids, working ones. It was nice to have someone to talk with when he hadn‘t had the aids in. Coulson told him that his father had been deaf and therefore it was no issue to talk to him in ASL.

But Coulson made him also go back to school to have at least his high school diploma. Clint thought it was silly. He was twenty-seven and had never ever needed it.

~*~*~

When he was thirty he wasn‘t sure what to think of the strange redhead who took one look at him and then signed. Fluently. Switching from English to Russian. So he took her back to S.H.I.E.L.D., argued with Coulson and Fury. The latter one yelling at him and Clint really wanted to take out his hearing aids, but he got used to the noise, including Fury‘s yelling. He only took them out in the evening.

~*~*~

Clint was thirty-nine when Bucky went down on one knee in front of him while trying to sign. Clint just gaped at him. Bucky didn‘t know ASL. And now… he was signing? Well, kind of, it was sloppy, difficult to read, but it was obvious that Bucky had been practicing.

And then he noticed that Bucky began to fidget, holding up a ring now, looking as uncomfortable as someone probably can be.

„Please, I know it didn‘t come out right but I‘m still learning, but I can already sign the everyday lines, but I don‘t know if I did it right, so… will you marry me? If not, please say it now. I will just hide away then.“

„You‘re learning ASL?“, he asked baffled and then it sunk in what Bucky had said.

„Nonono, no hiding. I mean, yes, I want to marry you.“, Clint rambled and went down to his knees, getting blinded by Bucky‘s smile.

„Why would you learn ASL?“

Bucky stuck the ring on Clint‘s finger and he had to admit, it looked nice. Then he looked at Clint as if he lost his mind.

„Your hearing aids make you uncomfortable and I know that I mumble. Still want to be able to talk to you. Of course, I would learn ASL for you.“

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Clint Barton Bingo on Tumblr](https://clintbartonbingo.tumblr.com/), which can also be found here on AO3.
> 
> You can find [my Tumblr here](https://ruquas-dreambell.tumblr.com/). If you have a request or anything, just let me know it there :)


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